Your Peace
by Jennifer Jolie
Summary: The Mutant Registration Act has been introduced. Humans are at war with mutants. 'Jean watched, and saw the Mansion fall to its knees at the inaugural ceremonies of fire... this was worse than a nightmare, it was the collapse of a dream.'


Response to MultiFandom SF's challenge: _The Mutant Registration Act has been introduced. Humans are at war with Mutants. The Mansion is gone, everyone separated, and two X-Men (the main characters in the story--villains or heroes, dead or alive, your choice) are on the run. _It's a fabulous challenge but I technically didn't fulfill every point of it. I hope she can find it her heart to forgive me!

X2 setting. You'll see...

--

I thought the Prayer of Saint Francis was of Saint Francis Xavier, but it's Saint Francis of Assisi, sorry. So some potential symbolism isn't there, but the prayer is as amazing as the day it was written. :) Glory to God...

Some lines are straight from the comics. Hopefully you'll notice a couple of other lines snuck in from here and there.

Finally, I will be updating some of my other stuff once I clear my mountain of homework. Thanks so much for reading and reviewing, please keep at it because that keeps me going:D

--

Your Peace

Jean watched, and saw the Mansion fall to its knees at the inaugural ceremonies of fire. Others watched too, and still others whispered, _humans and mutants can never live together_, but many more had eyes and did not see, had ears and did not hear.

In the future in her mind's eye, the school lay unstirring, but for the thick, choking dust that swirled above the dead ruins of rubble and ash. Gone. So many things, gone.

She tried before to speak, "Scott..."

"...now when you have a nightmare the whole bedroom shakes."

"My dreams are getting worse."

But how could she possibly expect him to understand?

"I... I keep feeling something terrible is going to happen." The words stumbled out, clumsy, awkward, and almost devoid of meaning.

The professor would have understood, she could have told him every detail. But what if it was just a hunch? Or, worse still, some kind of subconscious slip? She hadn't been herself lately.

And so Jean slept, to forget, and she awoke only to remember – _some say humans and mutants can never live together._

The burning school collapsed for the third night in a row.

And Jean screamed although she couldn't hear her own voice through the haze, because this was worse than a nightmare; it was the collapse of a dream.

--

In retrospect, Ororo thought, of _course_ the passing of the Mutant Registration Act was forseeable. The pattern was there if you looked for it: the unfavorable portrayal of mutants in textbooks, entertainment, the news; the gut feeling they all had that had led them to keep a low profile all their lives. Even the sky was unsettled, and the clouds tossed and rolled like chronic insomniacs.

But it wasn't right. And maybe it still could have been avoided – if some teleporting mutant hadn't tried to assassinate the president.

_Mutant Freedom Now!_

After that, Ororo stopped watching the news. She felt like she'd lost patience with the entire world.

--

The Mutant Registration Act was passed.

And within the week, a sententious group in the name of the government came to take the children away. Needless to say, under one of the provisions of the Act, the government assumed custody of all minors, to be detained until further notice. There were murmurs:

"Why d'we have to leave the school?"

"What'll they do to us at Registration?"

"What have _we_ done?"

The children were led down the hallways in a single downcast file. Counted and recounted. Some of the older ones like Rogue and Bobby were trying to look brave, but the way they were gripping each other's hands – Rogue's, gloved – told a different story. They were forced to let go for a minute while government agents snapped identification bracelets around their wrists. One by one, all of them were tagged, numbered, labelled.

At the back of the line, Bobby was bending over to mumble into Xavier's ear, "Professor... just one minute... make a wall of ice..."

"No."

"But we could all make a run for it!" Now Rogue was listening too, her expression shifty as she looked down at her gloved hands.

"No, Bobby, I can't allow you to do that." Xavier looked him squarely in the eye. "Nor can I stop you. From this moment on, you're no longer under my aegis. What are you going to do?"

Bobby didn't move.

"Think about what I've taught you. What is our highest aim?"

Rogue fidgeted. "Understanding," she said softly. "Acceptance. Peace."

"I wish I could do more," said Xavier, "but as of now, I can only say, hold. And wait."

Bobby stepped back into his place in the line and no more was said after that.

John was nowhere to be found. They were all questioned to the point where Ororo nearly got into a fistfight with one of the government agents and Jean had to pull her back.

"You'll have to go before this Friday, anyway," the official snarled.

"Yeah, but you'll never take us in handcuffs," Ororo hissed back.

Jean caught sight of a silent tear dripping down Rogue's chin.

And then they were all gone. The Mansion was uncannily quiet, so quiet that every room seemed suffocating.

"They'll have to do more than that," Scott said grimly, as he slammed and bolted the front door shut. By tacit agreement, all the teachers stayed. For one thing, they had really nowhere else to go.

--

The day after the students had been apprehended, the parents came.

" –keeping my son here!"

"My wife and I were led to believe that this was a respectable institution, a _prep school_, but it turns out to be a base for your clandestine–!"

Charles Xavier forbid them to leave the room. "It's me they want to see. Do not, under any circumstance, break into hostilities. Do you understand?"

_Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace..._

Unescorted, he left the room _where there is hatred, let me sow love _and Scott got up to close the door.

_Where there is injury, pardon..._

Ororo, her temper ever failing her in such times, paced the room relentlessly. Jean shut her eyes, too afraid to move, helplessly close to tears w_here there is doubt, faith..._

_Where there is despair, hope..._

Scott squeezed Jean's hand – her fingers were cold. Worried, he turned to look at her face. Jean's eyelids fluttered, but her expression was rigid, and her eyes were sightlessly glassy and _where there is darkness, light..._

"I know what I'm doing," she murmured, "but this is the only way."

Scott's heart pounded. "Professor!"

But it was too late.

--

_And where there is sadness, joy._

_--_

_O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console..._

All was quiet in the room, save for the sound of Ororo's heels clicking back and forth across the floor. After ten minutes of listening to their strained breathing, Scott stood up.

"I have to go out there."

Ororo faced him squarely. "The professor said-"

"The professor is dead!"

Both Scott and Ororo spun around, shocked. Jean, reeling from her outburst, covered her mouth with her hand and started to cry.

Then the mob broke down the front door, and all hell broke loose.

--

_To be understood as to understand,_

_Mutant Freedom Now!_

To the inaugural ceremonies of fire...

--

The building lay in ruins, and the man lay lifelessly on the ground.

Scott held Charles Xavier's hand, and said his last goodbye in a voice barely above a whisper, "Thank you for taking me in. Taking us in... You have taught me everything in my life that is worth knowing."

Behind him, Ororo put a hand on Jean's shoulder. "You want to talk?" Jean nodded almost imperceptibly, and they began walking away, Scott's voice trailing off in the distance.

"...and I want you to know that I'll take care of them."

--

Once they were out of earshot, Jean threw her arms around the other woman and sobbed freely, and Ororo couldn't hold her own tears back any longer.

_Some will say humans and mutants can never live together._

_But never Charles Xavier._

The moment passed. Jean wiped her eyes.

"I still don't know why, Ororo. And nothing's going to get any clearer now. Sometimes I'd spend the whole night trying to figure it out..."

"It?"

"Why we'd keep risking our lives to protect a world that fears and hates us."

"Let me know when you have an answer..."

"Thing is, Professor Xavier... he didn't found the X-Men to fill the family graveyard. I wonder, if he'd known the price of his dream...?"

"We know that price, yet we always keep coming back for more," Ororo said wryly.

"Like Arthur and his knights of the round table." Ororo looked up at Jean, eyebrow raised at her sudden swerve. Jean explained, "The professor's favourite book, _The Once and Future King_. But he always saw himself as Merlin, showing the way."

_To be loved, as to love..._

Ororo rounded on Jean, face serious. "Have you ever wondered, then, who represents King Arthur? Like him, we cannot forever use our teacher as a crutch."

Jean hesitated, then nodded slowly

"We can't stay here long. What do you say – do we run, or do we take the last stand?" Ororo managed a smile bravely.

Jean let out a long breath. "'Ro, I have to tell you something. Something not even Scott knows."

The smile melted off her lips. "What is it?"

Jean swallowed. "I'm pregnant."

--

And of course, Ororo wants to ask _that_ question, "Are you sure?"

At the last minute she gets around the words and manages, "Congratulations."

--

And, "When are you going to tell Scott?"

Jean bit her lip. "I don't know. Ororo, I'm scared, with things the way they are, but I can look out for myself. I don't want him to worry..." Absently, almost to herself, "He'll find out."

"We'll be on the run from now on, you know. But we could regroup. Some kind of underground movement..."

"Another sanctuary."

"We'll have to start over. We'll have to keep moving, go someplace where no one knows who we are."

Jean cracked a smile. "You know, we might have to do something about your hair."

"Maybe some prices are too high..."

"At least you don't have blue skin too." Jean paused. "What about that mutant who tried to assassinate the president?"

"What about him?"

"He might be the key to all this."

They started walking back to where Scott had been. "You think so?" Ororo asked.

"It's a good a theory as any. I doubt he would've launched a solo attack like that, even with the element of surprise on his side. He's got a team, or he's working for someone."

"Could be. God knows, I wouldn't do it by myself."

Jean sighed.

"Hmm?"

"'Ro... The kids, wherever they are. I hope they're not alone. I hope they have friends with them..."

Ororo bowed her head. "Amen," she said.

--

_For it is in giving that we receive;_

_it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;_

_and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen._

end.

--

And because the DVD has deleted scenes (!), so have I:

"We'll have to start over. We'll have to keep moving, go someplace where no one knows who we are."

Jean smiled brightly. "You know, we might have to do something about your hair. I know the Best Hair Salon in the World... it's at the bottom of Alkali Lake!"

--

Some optional notes on how this could've changed the outcome of X2: Nightcrawler, still drugged under Stryker, grabs Jean (or Jean and Ororo), Stryker drugs Jean to use Cerebro to find and kill all mutants. (Arguably, its own peace? Not much fun, though.) In the meantime, Xavier's dead, Magneto's still in his plastic prison, and Wolverine is wandering around Canada, totally out of the picture, good grief. My authorish notes concluded with "Scott... GAH, WHERE TO PUT SCOTT?" Ah, the question all scriptwriters ask themselves...

Feedback will be appreciated with hugs and kisses!


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